Fernando Alonso of Spain and Aston Martin Aramco F1 Team drives to the grid- Source: Getty
Former Aston Martin team principal Otmar Szafnauer revealed that he paid the salaries of the employees 'twice" before Lawrence Stroll's takeover in mid-2018. The Silverstone-based outfit has gone through several changes, post its Jordan days. They became Spyker and later transformed into Force India after Indian businessman Vijay Mallya owned them.
However, despite their reputation of 'punching above their weight', in terms of their results on track given their budget, the outfit went into administration during the 2018 season.
While appearing on the High-Performance podcast, Otmar Szafnauer provided insights into the period of hard times in the team and his personally paying 'millions' to the unpaid staff. He said:
"It was in the millions. And I knew the salaries were not going to get paid. And I know how difficult that is for people. You know, some people live from paycheque to paycheque and I understand it. And I just couldn’t, we had to pay the salaries."
